JOURNAL OF THE COUNTY DONEGAL HISTORICAL SOCISTY fair which the good people held on Stuckan Hill. Coastal erosion and shifting sands h a v e wrought ma'lly changes, down the centuries in the Dooey plain and these 'are still at work. The plain is to-day a sand strewn rabbit warren which, year by year, is encroaching on what was once wooded country, tilled fields and human habitations. ,Rabbits aind contrary winds were responible for the breakup of the burial mound and the surface of several acres of sandy pasture around it. This has shewn that the burial mound is surrounded by a wide sub-strata of shells; in some :places. upwa,rds of two to three feet deep; and in other places with alternative layers of sand ,and shells. These layers are mostly co,okle and . periwinkle, but here and there they carry individual mounds of oyster, clam or mussel shells. The burial mound was eliptical in shHJpe-its axis 100 by 75 y a r d s .approximately - and around its base I found the remains of various f.ire sites associated with middens strewn with animal bones and teethox, boar, and horse. At least two of these fire sites were used by Bronze Age ipeoples. At one of them I picked up a small frag· ment of a pottery mould, casting a wedge-shaped object, which haid a 'frngment o,f coppery hmnze still embedded in the pointed end of the mould. A few feet away I found two small fragments of a well :frred crucible 1pointed base and a portion of the curved lip. Each was coated inside with particles of bronze. This site was strewn with roi'llute bronze pelets and much of the decomposed matter which indicated the occupational level of this site iwas impregnated with powdered copper. It was at this site that a bronze brooch and several bronze pins were found some years ago. (6) Some bvonze pins are still found there -so I was informed by people in the locality. On the opposite side 253. of the mound I found another site which was indicated by a very deep layer of charcoal in which was embedded the thiokly walled base of a pottery vessel whom very irregular outside surface was glazed with a dark green glossy substance. On this site I picked up several small E•heets of bronze', some beaten as thin as a sheet of fine brown paper; some .bronze chain links, bronze brooch pins, a wooden bead and several flint chips (7). Flint chi:ps are to be found all over this area, particu1arly, amongst the human bones, in t.he burial mound where I found a small well worked button Ecraper and also a well worked ciycular stO·ne with an edged circumference and a flattened top and bottom. This stone is too well worked to be dismissed as a rubber and may have been closely associated with the burial ritual of this mass inhumation (.8). On the other hand what may have been a Christiain assodation with the burial came to light with a Latin Cross inscribed on a small slab which was found amongst the s·keletons and which I have had P·laced, for safety, on the wall of Mr. Boyle's front garden. My last visit to Dooey was made in May 1950 and I found that some of the sites were again being covered with sand. Nature h'.1ving offered some of her secrets to the mid-Twenteth century archaeologists, and being ignored by them (9) has very wisely begun to conserve what remains of Stuckan-for the explorations of future ex.perts in this science. The most recent addition to the list of known ~Sandhill Settlements came to my notice when bathing at Rossnowlagh. A large pa.rt of the Golf Links there has the a;ppearance of a raised beach towards which the present strand is receeding quite r.gpidly. During the late Emel'gency, for instance, a pillbox was erected in the sand dunes and that portioo of land which screened it from the sea has disappeared during
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